Mobile phones have originally had ringing tones similar to ordinary telephones, which have mainly resembled the ringing of a clock. When a mobile phone of a specific make and model had one fixed ringing tone problematic situations occurred, when two users in the same space had the same type of mobile phone and, thus, the same kind of ringing tone, in which case it was confusing as to whose phone was actually ringing. This problem has been solved by making the ringing tone dependent on either the user's own telephone number or the telephone number of a caller. However, the ringing tones produced on the basis of two almost identical telephone numbers may sound so much alike, that it is difficult to distinguish one ringing tone from the other. In addition, by producing a ringing tone on the basis of a telephone number, ringing sound effects with different tones are mainly achieved, which may even annoy the user, i.e., the user is not allowed to select a ringing tone to his/her liking.
This problem has been solved further as mobile phones have become more advanced. Currently, mobile phones normally have several pre-stored ringing tones from amongst which the user may select the preferred ringing tone. In addition to ordinary ringing tones, melodies from familiar pieces of music have been implemented as ringing tones by means of modern technology, and they are also amongst the ringing tones to choose from. With the enormous increase in the use of mobile phones, it has turned out that even as many as ten different ringing tones in a mobile phone are not enough to solve the problem of several mobile phone users thinking that it is their phone ringing, when someone else's phone is ringing. In addition, it may be that the user does not like any of the pre-stored ringing tones. Ordinary telephones, which have a limited number of different types of ringing tones, often present a similar problem.
This situation has been improved by enabling ringing tones to be programmed by means of a user interface of a telephone or other communication device. One solution has been presented in U.S. Pat. No. 4,866,766, wherein a user can input in a telephone different kinds of parameters, which define a ringing tone sequence, in the form of a pulse, such as frequency, pulse length, the number of pulses in a group, period between pulses, the number of pulse groups etc. These parameters are input as different numbers. Another kind of solution has been presented in Publication WO 92/03891, wherein a ringing tone of a paging device can be programmed by switching on or illuminating specific pixels on a matrix display. The position of the pixels in the vertical direction corresponds to a specific pitch of a note (E, F, G, A, H, C, D) and the duration of a note is determined according to the successive pixels. Another corresponding solution has been presented in Publication EP 684 591 A1, wherein it is possible to program, on a display of a paging device, a ringing tone so that the pitch of a note is displayed on the display as a letter symbol (DO, RE, MI, FA, SO, LA, TI) and the duration of a note can be modified as a sequence of a number of the same letter symbols. Due to the defects of the solutions presented above, regarding the programming of a ringing tone, a solution has been presented in Finnish Patent Application 960858, submitted on Feb. 23, 1996, wherein it is possible, e.g., to program a ringing tone as notes by inputting the notes graphically on a stave, displayed on a display, directly in the form of graphic notes.
However, the programming of ringing tones through a user interface has its disadvantages. A user has to take the trouble to input different kinds of parameters, characters or notes in different ways. In addition, in many of the examples presented above, the user is supposed to have a knowledge of music theory in order to produce a specific melody in his/her telephone.